In Draw a drawing is made on a predefined drawing area or canvas. This will usually be in the Letter or DIN A4 format depending on your locale settings, and will be output to some “standard” printer that you have set up on your computer (usually referred to as the Default Printer). Depending on the actual size of the drawn objects it will often be necessary or convenient to reduce or enlarge the drawing by some scaling value. The scale that you wish to use can be input under Tools > Options > OpenOffice.org Draw > General.

The scale and selected unit of measurement will be automatically reflected in the ruler(s), the window position and the window size. If you work regularly with scaled drawings it may be useful to store the details in a template which you can call up when you start a new drawing and not have to input the various settings every time.

Whether you draw in a 1:1 scale or in another has no effect on the basic drawing operations. Draw will automatically calculate for you the necessary values (for example dimension lines). The grid spacing is independent of drawing scale as the grid is not a drawing element but only an optical drawing aid.

If you want to insert elements in a drawing from the Gallery or Clipboard you should draw these to the same scale as you are using for the drawing to ensure the proper size ratio is maintained.